


I'd Stop the World and Melt With You

by dealan



Category: Warehouse 13
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-06-22
Updated: 2014-06-23
Packaged: 2018-02-05 17:46:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,542
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1826815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dealan/pseuds/dealan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Helena is trapped somewhere in an alternate timeline, and it's up to Myka to find her. Along the way, the roads not taken lead to revelations about herself and HG.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: S4 never happened. The watch was never Magellan’s. Artie never went crazy/evil. HG is not left wasting away in suburbia. I reject your canon and replace it with my own.
> 
> Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction - all events and actions are completely made up. Absolutely nothing in this story should be taken as fact. This original work of fan fiction is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/); attribution should include a link to this page.

Looking back on it, as she would a thousand times, cycling through the sequence of events over and over in her mind, three things stood out that Myka should have done before the blast.

She should have noticed sooner that Helena was not helping them break the bomb open.

She should have moved faster to keep Helena by her side.

She should have held onto her when she had the chance and never let go.

But at the time, things had been moving too quickly. The adrenaline had her heartbeat thumping in her ears so loudly she could hardly hear herself speak. One moment they were brainstorming over how to break open the case; the next moment, she was experiencing a passing wave of nausea, and Artie was slumped over. Between her panicked grab to catch him and Pete almost dropping the blowtorch in his hand, there just wasn't enough time.

There was never enough time.

"Artie! Artie, wake up!" Myka shook him hard, grasping his shoulders. He jerked awake with a gasp, and she breathed a quick sigh of relief. "What happened? Are you okay?"

Artie blinked owlishly at her for a second, then looked over at Pete before bursting into action. "Pete! Forget the blowtorch!" he shouted, yanking Myka in the opposite direction. "Grab the bomb and put it on the floor- and HG! Stop what you're doing!"

It was only then that Myka noticed that Helena was standing on the opposite side of the room, holding two wires up carefully, the electricity crackling between them. The look in her eyes unsettled Myka; instead of the mix of fear and desperation she expected them all to share, there was a calm serenity to Helena, and that more than anything raised her alarms.

"Artie, I know you don't trust me," Helena began, "but I have an idea-"

"Oh no, I trust you," he huffed.

Helena pulled a face in surprise. "You do?"

"He does?" Pete and Myka said in unison.

He waved them off absently, pulling Pete to his side. "Yes, and there's an anomaly, I know, but _don’t_ put it over _us_. Put it over _that_." He pointed at the bomb that now sat in a clearing in the middle of the room.

She hesitated, and Myka watched as her face scrunched up into a familiar expression, the one Helena always had when she was doing the mental gymnastics in her head for whatever calculation her latest experiment required. "It might not hold," Helena finally replied.

Artie shook his head. "The anomaly should trick the Warehouse into thinking that device is outside of the barrier. It will switch to containing the danger and protect itself. It’ll be the only barrier and it will hold. Trust me."

The timer on the floor ticked away the seconds on the clock. Twenty-seven seconds and counting. Whatever it was they were talking about doing, they had to do it soon.

"Do it," Myka said. She shrugged and smiled helplessly at Helena. "Break the rules, right?"

Helena took a deep breath and centered herself. "Stand back, then." She turned slowly and touched the tips together. "And here we go…"

Myka's eyes widened as a cobalt spark crackled and jumped into the air, and with a flash, a barrier materialized over the bomb. In her peripheral vision, she could see Pete gripping Artie's arm anxiously and Artie's strange maniac grin, but all Myka could focus on was the twinkling satisfaction shining in Helena's eyes as the force field stabilized.

Together, they watched the timer count down.

There was still a chance the bomb would kill them all.

It did nothing to shake the absolute faith she had that they had beat the odds again.

"Thank you," Myka mouthed across the room.

The blinding smile Helena sent her through the energy field was the last thing Myka saw before her vision was engulfed in white light and a blast knocked her to the ground.

++

The tinny sound of buzzing stirred Myka back into consciousness. She groaned as she sat up sluggishly, pain searing along her side.

"Pete?" she said feebly, seeking out her partner, drawn to sound of the Farnsworth nearby.

The sight of Pete's body prone body on the ground jolted her into action.

"PETE!" She scrambled toward him, ignoring the bruising pain in her ribs and dizzying ringing reverberating in her skull. She examined him carefully, grateful to find that he was still breathing, though knocked out cold. Blood trickled near his hairline, and a nasty knot was forming on his temple. "Pete, wake up," she said, cradling his head.

The incessant call of the Farnsworth finally registered, and she reached into his pocket to retrieve it.

"Oh thank beejesus you're alive." Claudia exhaled loudly in relief.

Leena leaned into frame. "We felt the blast from the Inn. Is everyone okay?"

"I'm fine," Myka answered shakily. "But Pete-"

"Ugh, am alive too,” he groaned from underneath. Myka looked down and smiled at him in relief. Pete smiled weakly back. “Barely, but still here."

"I'm all right, too," Artie added, touching Myka's shoulder, surprising her from behind. He reached over and took the Farnsworth from Myka, allowing her to offer Pete a hand to slowly get him on his feet.  "Myka's fine, Pete's okay, and H.G…" he trailed off.

Relief swiftly coiled into fear as Myka turned around, expecting to see Helena lying in pain somewhere in the room; instead, she was met with an even more troubling scene: blackened spot where the bomb went off and no Helena in sight.

"Artie?" Claudia prompted.

"HG!" Myka called out, her heart beating faster, as she walked closer to the place where Helena stood, searching the aisle for a glimpse of dark hair and pale skin. "Helena!"

"Claud, we'll call you back," Pete mumbled in the background.

Myka rounded on Artie. "Where is she?"

"I don't know," he replied, bewildered.

"You said it'd be fine, Artie." The panic rose in her voice, but she couldn't help it.

"Is she-" Pete hedged.

"No. She can't be. There'd be a body."

"Then where is she?" Myka asked again.

"She's just…gone." Myka's heart clenched tightly as Artie blanched in horror. She stood frozen, hands balled into fists at her side. 

Then Artie shook his head furiously, breaking her reverie. "No, that can't be right. She's supposed to be here. I did the calculations perfectly. Claudia checked them twice."

Pete shot Myka a puzzled look. "Artie, what's going on?"

"I don't understand," he continued. " We went over everything. The watch only gives us the chance to change only one thing, and-"

"Artie," Myka interrupted.

"-according to our calculations, the Warehouse should have sensed that the bomb was the only danger, so it should have compensated, unless the shift -

"ARTIE!" they shouted in unison, breaking his rant.

 Artie jerked his head up. "That's it! She's-"

And in a blink of eye, he vanished from the room before their very eyes.


	2. Chapter 1

Pete and Myka stared at each other, dumbfounded.

"Pete, did you just-"

"Yeah, Mykes. What the hell just happened?"

"I have no idea but Artie was talking about a watch, which means it's artifact related."

"Artie using an artifact?" Pete shook his head. "No way. He's Mr. Artifacts-are-dangerous-Pete. Mr. Artifacts-aren't-toys-Pete. He once gave me two weeks of goo duty just for playing with Disney's Mickey Mouse Ears."

Myka grabbed Pete’s hands from the mouse ears gesture he was making on his head and brought him back to focus. "But we have used them before, in special circumstances. Something extreme, like say, the Warehouse exploding?" 

"I say we go to the Inn, talk to Mrs. F and see if she knows anything about it." 

Myka pulled Pete to a stop. "Wait, how do we make sure that we don't disappear?"

He paused before turning to the right. "That way. I got a vibe."

++

After weaving through the maze of aisles in the most circuitous way possible, Pete and Myka finally made their way to the overlook of the Warehouse. What they saw was nothing short of baffling, even by their standards. Whole sections of the Warehouse shimmered in and out of sight, flickering like a strobe light.

"Oh, man," Pete said quietly.

Some spots held steady for a while, only to disappear and reappear, and there was no method to the madness, no pattern that Myka could see. She pulled Pete away from the railing. "Come on. We have to get Mrs. Frederic."

Bolstered by the gravity of the situation, Myka strode into the office with a strengthened determination to get some answers.

What she didn't expect was for Artie, Leena, and Claudia to magically appear in the empty room in the blink of an eye, which was how Pete collided into Claudia and found himself on the floor again.

+++

"Wait, wait, I still don't understand.” Pete waved his arm in the air. Leena tsked in response, pushed him back onto the seat, and dabbed the alcohol swab over his cut. “Start- ow-”

“Sorry,” she said.

“-start from the beginning again. What do you mean Artie's from another universe?"

"And where is HG?" Myka asked again.

As Pete sat on the couch, holding an ice pack to his head, and Leena patched up the cut on his forehead, Myka stood to the side, fiddling with an ice pack of her own. The numbing effect on her ribs made it easier to focus on watching Artie and Claudia’s progress, as the two hunched over the computer.

"We are working on that," he said reassuringly. "Claudia, how are we doing?"

Claudia clicked furiously at her keyboard. "Only a couple sections are still experiencing temporal phasing, but everywhere else is back to normal."

"Concentrate your efforts in those sections," he said, pointing to the screen.

Not for the first time, Myka wondered how things could deteriorate so quickly. 

First they had lost Steve. Then Helena had been kidnapped; then Myka herself almost died. Just when they thought they had managed to stop Sykes, they found a bomb as his parting gift.

And now people were vanishing in front of her eyes because Artie was, apparently, from another universe.

All in the last 48 hours.

Seeing Artie, solid and alive and with a clear plan, made her feel better, but the knot in her stomach refused to disappear, not with Helena still missing. The toll of the last two days was starting to weigh on her spirit, and her body was starting to feel the effects. Exhaustion was already seeping into her whole being, and Myka wasn’t sure how many more hits she could take before breaking.

"Artie, please," she pleaded, frustration boiling to the surface.

Artie turned towards his agents and sighed. 

"Think of time as like a waterfall," he began.

He walked over to the glassboard and drew a series of parallel lines with his marker. "Every stream of water represents a parallel universe for every decision ever made," he said, pointing to one of the lines. "In one stream you zigged; in another-"

"Ralph Brunsky never stuck my head in a toilet every day for a week in the third grade,” Pete called over from his seat. “Got it."

"But, if this is you," he said, holding up his marker, "you can only be in one stream at a time." He moved the marker across the lines, one by one to demonstrate his point. "No matter how many times you cross, a person can only exist in one universe at a time. At least, not without the help of an artifact."

Myka nodded. "So although there are all these parallel universes moving through time…"

"The only timestream that is real to us is the one we're in," Artie finished. He pulled out a gold watch from his pocket and held it out for them to see. "This watch belonged to William Rowan Hamilton. It allows the holder to cut through the universes and bring a new universe into reality, a world where a single choice was made differently.”

“So what happened to our Artie?" Pete asked, standing up and moving next to Myka. "Or are you our Artie?”

Artie rolled his eyes. “I’ve always been your Artie. I just have extra memories of days that will thankfully never happen.”

Myka recalled the moments before the bomb went off, and the pieces started to fall into place in her mind. "You have two sets of memories in your head," she whispered, the implications slowly dawning on her. "Isn’t that a little dangerous?"

“I’ll be fine,” he reassured her. “Well, except for a mild feeling of nausea.”

“But what if you had been wrong? You used an artifact –”

"I had to!" he protested. "In our original timeline, things went horribly wrong."

"How much worse could they have been than now?” she asked hotly. “Steve is dead, and Helena is missing!"

"Ohhhh, it was so much worse!” he said manically, hands waving to punctuate his point. “The Warehouse was destroyed! HG died sacrificing herself to save us! And Mrs. Frederic…"

"What happened to Mrs. Frederic?" Leena cut in, concern lacing her voice.

“And back up to the part where HG died,” Pete said, taking in the stricken look on Myka’s face.

"It's not important,” Artie insisted. “The point is everything that mattered was lost, and I had a way to bring it all back.”

“Only now, the Warehouse is Quantum Leaping everywhere, because it's still not done phasing into this reality,” Claudia called over her shoulder.

Pete snapped his fingers. "That's why you disappeared. You were standing in a part of the Warehouse that jumped into the future, where you'd be up here."

Hope flared in Myka's chest. "So HG is just stuck somewhere in the Warehouse?"

"No," Claudia answered, spinning away from the computer in her chair.

"No?" Artie echoed in confusion.

She shook her head sadly. "No sign of her anywhere. Everything reads as normal in the Warehouse. She's not here."

"She wouldn't be." A voice called from behind them.

“Mrs. Frederic,” Artie breathed. Myka took in his expression, frowning slightly at the mix of longing and relief written across his face. Just what had happened to Mrs. Frederic in the other timeline?

"Arthur, you have been tampering with things you shouldn't."

Artie crossed his arms stubbornly. "It had to be done. The risk was too high. You know that."

"We'll discuss that at a later time. For now we have more pressing matters. I do not sense Ms. Wells' presence anywhere in the Warehouse, and given of the number of times her body and her consciousness have been tampered with, I'm inclined to believe the combination of the blast from the bomb and the…move was too much to handle."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait," Claudia interrupted. "So we're saying what exactly?"

"That the molecules holding her body together may have scattered into dark matter," Mrs. Frederic said plainly.

Pete blinked. "Dark matter. As in the theoretical invisible stuff holding the universe together?"

Four heads whipped around and stared at Pete incredulously.

"What? It was an X-Files episode. Total classic. Step into his shadow and PHOOMP." He motioned with his hands as he spoke, earning eye rolls from Claudia and Myka.

Mrs. Frederic merely raised her eyebrow. "Despite Agent Lattimer's gross oversimplification, he is not wrong. And as the Warehouse was still in phase at the time of blast--"

"Oh no."

Myka felt the knot of tension in her stomach grow at the sound of Artie's tone.

"Yes, I'm afraid so. She's lost somewhere in another timeline."


	3. Chapter 2

Myka stood rooted in her spot as she absorbed Mrs. Frederic's words.

"We must hurry," Mrs. Frederic continued." The soul can only stay without a body for so long. If it does not have a body to inhabit, it will try to fuse with the body of the HG in that universe. The results could be disastrous."

Pete snorted. "Two things trying occupy the same space? You don't need to tell me twice. Damn griffins."

"No, it's worse than that, Pete," Artie said. "Two identical souls competing for the same space wouldn't just try to destroy each other like it did with you and Myka. Because they are the exactly same, the soul energy of their HG and our HG would be both repelled and attracted to each other. At best, it'd rip a tear in the fabric of that universe."

"And at worst?" Myka asked weakly.

"It would continue to tear through the parallel universes like a bullet, destroying every single H.G. Wells in existence."

Myka swallowed hard. The idea of any universe without H.G. Wells was unbearable enough. The possibility that she'd be erased from all the universes to ever exist was unthinkable. "So what do we do?"

"We have to force H.G.'s body to materialize before her soul energy collects and merges with the H.G. in that universe." Mrs. Frederic gestured to the computer. "Arthur, I believe Mr. Twain's telescope, Rubin’s glasses and Zwicky's gun should do the trick."

"Yes, yes. That should do it. Claudia?"

"Already on it," she replied, typing furiously on the keyboard to search for the location. "Although now would be a good time to point out that Artie used an artifact to save the Warehouse, and now we're using two to save H.G., so it seems like _sometimes_ when it’s to keep people alive, special cases can be made for artifacts."

"Claudia…" Artie said warningly.

"The telescope is in the Twain Section, aisle 14. Fritz Zwicky's gun and Vera Rubin's glasses are in Newton, aisles 32 and 35, " she answered quickly.

"Leena, can you help Mrs. Frederic retrieve those items?"

She nodded curtly, leaving Claudia, Myka, and Pete alone in the office with Artie.

"Claudia, listen to me," Artie began. "I used the watch because I had no choice. The destruction of Pandora’s box would have set off a chain of events that would have ended the world. No amount of agents would have been able to stop it, and especially with how few of us there are left as it is."

"All the more reason bring back Steve," Claudia insisted.

"To a life tied forever to a metronome?” he countered. “To be in constant fear that someone might find it and stop it at any time? And there’s always a down side to artifacts. Steve wouldn't want to live like that."

"How do you know that? You don’t know what he’d say. You don't know him like I do. I'm his best friend!" Claudia whirled around and looked pleadingly at Myka. "Explain this to them, Myka."

"Claud-"

"No, you know exactly what I'm talking about," she said angrily. "I know you do because you feel the same way I do, the way you feel for H.G. Only more because Steve and I were never in love."

Myka felt her entire world stop as Claudia's words hung in the air. For a moment, she wondered if the Warehouse truly had stopped experiencing time jumps.

"I-I'm…" she stammered. "We were never…"

She searched for the words to properly express their relationship, but the truth was, Myka had never said anything about how she felt about Helena out loud. Oh certainly, she had defended Helena to the Regents about her goodness. Had defended her brilliant mind to Artie and Pete.

But as to how she personally felt towards the maddening, amazing, frustrating woman?

It had always been this dance around the truth, a subject that everyone tiptoed delicately around as if on eggshells, first because of Artie’s mistrust in the beginning, then because of the scars Helena had left in her wake. It was plain to everyone, including herself, that Myka had been the most affected by Helena. Helena made her do things, question things about herself that no one else could. She could not deny that.

But to say that it was love? That she was _in_ love, and that Helena felt the same? They had never even said the words to each other. They had never even kissed.

"She’s just…" she struggled again.

"The person you know better than anyone else." Pete finished gently. Myka shot him a grateful look for the save.

"Which is why you must be the one to find her." Mrs. Frederic announced, appearing from behind them, artifacts in tow.

Myka straightened and turned towards Leena and Mrs. Frederic, pushing her mixed emotions to the back of her mind.

"Fritz Zwicky's gun," Artie explained as Mrs. Frederic handed her a 19th century revolver carefully. "The astrophysicist who first identified dark matter and supernovas. He had a…mild obsession with his gun. Used to shoot it into the air during experiments to prove his theories on air turbulence.”

“So what does it do?” Myka asked.

“Shooting this into the air releases a mini-supernova," Artie replied. Pete immediately jumped out the gun's path.

"If H.G's energy is close enough, the blast should give her the boost needed to pull her out of the dark matter," Mrs. Frederic added.

"A little Big Bang, basically," Claudia said.

"Exactly."

Pete clapped his hands together. "All right, so we get our Quantum Leap on, find HG, spark a little mini supernova, badda-bing-badda-boom, we're home before din-din time. Let's go."

Artie held up his hand. "Not so fast. Only one of us can go, and I think it should be me. I'm responsible for this mess, and I am more familiar with these artifacts."

"I believe Agent Bering is better suited for this task, Arthur. You know using the telescope will require a strong connection to Ms. Wells."

"Why can't we all go?" Claudia asked. "Won't it be easier to find her if there are more of us looking for her?"

"It's not that simple," Artie explained. "Mark Twain's telescope allows anyone who looks through it to pass safely through space and time. Think of the place you want to visit, look through the telescope and close your eyes; the next thing you know, you're waking up in the place and time that you imagined."

"Like a Yankee in King Arthur's Court," Myka said, recognition dawning on her face.

"Essentially, yes.” Artie nodded. “It's theorized that this is what he based that book on."

"So what's the problem?" Pete asked.

Artie took the telescope from Leena and held it up. "The problem is that we can't all look through the telescope at the same time. At best, two people can look through it, and even then, only just barely. Not to mention the fact that they both have to think of exactly the same place and the same time, and in our case, the same universe. It will be hard enough trying to get two people’s mind in sync.”

"There's more," Mrs. Frederic continued. "Jumping through alternate universes puts stress on a person that they were never meant to endure."

"At most, you have five jumps, including the jump back. Beyond that, well…we've never had anyone come home after five," Artie said, ruefully.

Mrs. Frederic shook her head. "And for that reason, Arthur, you cannot be the one to go. You've already jumped once when you used the watch."

“Twice, actually.” Artie shot an apologetic look at Claudia. “I _did_ try to save Steve. It didn’t work.”

"We're wasting time." Myka said firmly. "I'll do it." She holstered Zwicky's gun securely on the opposite hip as her Tesla and held out her hand to Artie with a determined look. "Just tell me what to do."

Reluctantly, he pressed the telescope into her open palm. "When you get there, find the H.G. Wells in that universe. The molecules of our H.G.'s body are most likely to be drawn there, as will her soul. You won’t be able to see it, but you’ll be able to feel a confluence of energy accumulating near the other H.G. When you do, shoot the gun at it. Our H.G. should materialize then."

Myka frowned at the idea of hitting an invisible target. "What if I miss? Or shoot too early?"

“You won’t be able to miss it with this,” Mrs Frederic reassured her, handing her a pair of dark rimmed glasses. "Vera Rubin’s glasses will allow you to see the dark matter, fitting for the woman who first proved its existence. As for the timing, it will either work or the supernova will force it into another universe, which means you'll have to chase her again." She squeezed Myka’s hand briefly. "Remember. Five times, including the jump back."

She stepped back from Myka and motioned for the rest to move away, leaving her in the center of the room.

"Close your eyes, Myka," she instructed. "Focus on your memories of Ms. Wells. Picture her in your mind and focus on finding her, on following her to whatever universe and time she is in. Hold that thought in your mind."

Myka reached into her pocket and closed her fingers tightly around Helena's locket.

"Now look through the telescope."

She lifted the telescope to her eyes and peered through the glass. Through it, she started to make out the shape of Helena's face, until light began to fill her sight. As the brightness forced her to close her eyes, she clung to memory of blinding smiles and twinkling eyes as light engulfed her vision once more.

++

"Honey," her mother's voice called out to her.

Myka opened her eyes slowly as the world swam into focus. Her mother crouched over her, with a troubled look on her face.

"Mom?"

For a second, Myka could believe it was all a bad dream, until she glanced around and recognized the shelves of books surrounding her. Her family's bookstore. Not the Warehouse. Then the urgent thought flew into the forefront of her mind: Helena.

"What happened?” her mother asked. “I go to check on a customer for five minutes, and the next, you're on the floor, passed out.” She helped Myka up to her feet and brushed non-existent dust from her shoulders. “Where are your glasses?”

Hastily, Myka pulled out Rubin’s glasses. “Right here,” she replied, showing them before tucking them back in her pocket. Her mother looked at her with such a concerned fondness that Myka felt a little overwhelmed. The care and attention she was receiving were in such sharp contrast to the cloud of despair she had felt for the last two days that the kindness threatened to undo her. She had to pull herself together.

"I’m fine, Mom.” Myka squeezed her lightly in a hug. “Really. I just fell."

And then, she heard it. The telltale click of the gun being cocked sounded behind her.

"Step away from my mother," a voice said angrily.

Myka winced in apology as she tightened her grip on her mother, drew her Tesla, and spun around quickly to face…herself.

Granted, it was a version of herself from almost a year ago, plaid shirt and glasses, but no less threatening wielding her service weapon, no less intimidating than she'd expect herself to be if someone was using her mother as a human body shield, as she was doing this very second.

Yup. It worked. Dorothy wasn’t in Kansas anymore.


End file.
